In 1989, Chinese students and workers shook the
world. Hundreds of thousands occupied Tiananmen Square in Beijing and
thousands more participated throughout the country. The movement
paralyzed the Chinese bureaucracy which was slowly transitioning the
planned economy toward capitalism.

Forty
years earlier, the Chinese Revolution led by the Chinese Communist
Party (CCP) overthrew capitalism and landlords. Foreign capitalist
interests were expelled and all production brought into state
ownership. But unlike the Russian Revolution in 1917, the Chinese
Revolution was based on a peasant uprising, not on democratic workers
councils. While the revolution was a massive step forward it was also
deformed at birth with a regime modelled on Stalinist Russia. Chinese
Stalinism was frequently brutal, a characteristic the CCP leadership
still has today.

When
students began their pro-democracy protests in 1989, this was a
revolt against the bureaucratic organization of the planned economy –
not, as some claimed, a desire to return to capitalism (though there
was a minority who held illusions in capitalism). As this movement
grew, it turned into a challenge to the domination of the Chinese
bureaucracy – but not a challenge to the planned economy as a whole.

However,
the tops of the CCP were not willing to go quietly and a
revolutionary situation was posed. Students began the initial
movement demanding democracy and an end to corruption. They were
joined in the streets by workers who quickly set up their own
independent organizations of struggle. Huge sections of the army
supported the struggle and refused orders to suppress the movement.
Eventually the Chinese bureaucracy brought in regiments that had been
kept in seclusion in order to violently put down the movement.

Today,
the Chinese working class is larger than ever but unlike thirty years
ago, the Chinese economy is based on a form of “state capitalism.”
Thus a revolutionary workers movement today would not limit itself to
political change but would also to roll back the market-based reforms
to reinstate a planned economy but crucially under the democratic
control of the working people themselves.

The
growth of the working class corresponds with the growth of the
Chinese economy which now challenges the U.S. economy for global
dominance. Trump’s trade war with China is an expression of that
fact. With an economy that produces enough manufactured goods to
supply the world, China’s economy has been based on low wages, a
lack of environmental protections, and government subsidies. However
in recent years, protest and strikes have forced the Chinese regime
to raise wages, and now some manufacturers are moving elsewhere in
search of more exploitable labor.

The
Chinese regime under the current leadership of President Xi Jinping
now seeks to challenge the U.S. and other imperialist powers for
control of markets and global political influence. However, the
Chinese government, corporations, and billionaires quake at the
thought of the working class moving into action, as it did thirty
years ago in a movement that culminated in the Tiananmen Square
Massacre on June 4, 1989.

Students
at the Start – Pro-Democracy

The
Chinese Revolution, from the beginning, was based on Stalinist
ideas. This meant the conscious installation of a bureaucracy with no
attempt at democratic workers control. While capitalism was
overthrown, it was replaced with a planned economy controlled by the
Chinese “Communist” Party led by an administrative caste, not run
by democratic workers’ councils like in the Russian Revolution of
1917.

Stalinism,
based on the rule of a parasitic caste, was not stable. Leon Trotsky
first explained that it would enter into crisis and this could have
two outcomes:a regime based on workers democracy pointing toward
socialism or the restoration of capitalism. The Tiananmen Square
movement and the market reforms that followed were confirmation of
this perspective.

The
Stalinist theory of “Socialism in One Country” was a conscious
abandonment of working-class internationalism. It put the needs of
the Soviet bureaucracy for interntional trade and political stability
over any working-class demands. This meant that after 1949, when
China adopted these ideas, its bureaurocracy refused to accept a
lower priority, and therefore, rather than forming a natural alliance
with the USSR, butted heads with USSR.

From
the 1970s on, China politically moved further away from the USSR and,
by aligning with the U.S., toward market-based reforms. Nonetheless,
by the late 1980s, economic crises alongside the movements demanding
democratic reforms in the USSR and the Eastern Bloc affected Chinese
society, particularly students who were angered by corruption and saw
democratic reforms as a crucial demand.

In
the leadership of the Chinese “Communist” Party (CCP) there were,
and remain power struggles based around the speed of market-based
reforms. That balance shifted when in the spring of 1989, Hu Yaobang,
a party leader seen as being more pro-democracy, died of a heart
attack. Two days later, on April 17, 700 students and teachers
marched into Tiananmen Square. They chanted “Long live Hu Yaobang,”
“long live democracy,” “down with corruption,” and “down
with autocracy” (Tiananmen 1989:
Seven Weeks That Shook the World,
chinaworker.info).

Five
days later, ignoring a government prohibition, 200,000 flooded into
Tiananmen Square. This movement grew at a rapid pace, eventually
including over one million people in 110 cities across China.
Students declared an indefinite strike and set up an “autonomous
federation” to coordinate. By the middle of May, workers in China
joined the struggle in their hundreds of thousands.

Dynamic
Democratic Movement Accelerates

The
growth of this movement, initially around basic democratic demands,
demonstrates the explosive nature of mass movements. Given the right
situation, the kindling can become a massive blaze. The spontaneous
action of the working class has the power to shut down the economic
and, therefore, political life of any nation.

However,
in the end, the Tiananmen Square movement did not win greater
democracy. Today, China is, if anything, more repressive. The censors
have buried the history of June 4, 1989 and even jails people who
publicly attempt to keep the memory alive. The only commemorations
happen in Hong Kong each year as thousands risk political retaliation
and travel from the mainland to take part.

The
rapid pace of events, the scale and widespread nature of the
movement, as well as the bloody determination of the bureaucracy to
crush the movement led to a situation that called for more than just
determination. Strategy and leadership was needed to take this
revolution to the next phase. As in all revolutionary situations, a
conscious, planned effort is needed to finish the revolution and pass
power over to the working class or the movement stalls out and allows
the forces of reaction a chance to reassert control. This type of
revolutionary leadership was missing in 1989. Many students believed
the bureaucracy would eventually listen to them – they paid for this
mistake with their lives.

Chinese
Workers Step to the Front

While
students kicked off the movement and were the most visible aspect in
the occupation of Tiananmen Square, the working class came to the
fore in this struggle. The urban working class had grown far stronger
since the 1949 Revolution. The Chinese bureaucracy was terrified of
this force organizing for itself against the interests of the ruling
caste who were increasingly focused on commerce with the U.S. and
capitalist world.

In
mid-May this is exactly what happened. Workers from across the
country demonstrated outside the headquarters of the All China
Federation of Trade Unions demanding independent unions – not ones
controlled by the state and CCP. Everywhere, working people were
organizing, going on strike, and demonstrating for democracy.

The
Chinese bureaucracy’s strategy was to divide the growing workers’
movement from the students in Tiananmen. At first, the students
actively resisted the solidarity of the workers, but the working
class intrinsically knew it had to unite. Students began a hunger
strike and workers from factories and workplaces around Beijing
joined the demonstrations in support of the hunger strike that turned
out half a million people on May 19.

The
Reaction of the Bureaucracy

At
first, the ruling politburo (the top CCP body) attempted to dialog
with the students – multiple leaders visited the Square in person.
However with the entrance of the working class into the struggle, the
tone changed quite quickly. Preparing to violently clear the Square,
Chinese Premier Li Peng declared that Beijing and much of the country
was in a “state of anarchy.” He exclaimed “It is impossible for
us [the bureaucracy] not to protect the safety and lives of students,
not to protect our socialist [sic] system.” The day after speaking
these words, martial law was declared. Li Peng would show he was more
concerned with his system than the lives of students.

The
bureaucracy found its normal tools for maintaining control were no
longer reliable. The police in Beijing had withdrawn from the
streets, yet with students directing traffic and maintaining order,
crime actually went down. Meanwhile, students and workers visited the
military barracks, where many students had served, and found
sympathetic ears.

Finally,
starting on June 4, the army swept into Tiananmen Square firing live
ammunition on protestors, driving tanks over any person in its way,
and leaving up to 1,000 people dead – though recently uncovered
evidence suggests up to 10,000 casualties. Eyewitness accounts
describe a massacre, not just in the Square, but in the surrounding
neighborhoods as the Chinese regime drowned the movement in blood.

Lessons
for Today

The
dominant view among students was that eventually the government would
have to compromise with the movement’s demands. This appeal to
power fell disastrously short.

Had
a revolutionary party existed in China at that time, it would have
pointed to the how Stalinist regimes were prepared to crush workers
revolts and movements that threatened their political rule. While
supporting the students’ demands for democracy, it would have
pointed to the limitations of capitalism and the dangers of further
market reforms. Instead, a socialist party would have defended the
planned economy but argued that it should be taken out of the hands
of the bureaucracy which was increasingly dismantling state services.
It would have argued for democratic elections to the boards of the
state-owned companies throughout China – putting the economy directly
into workers’ control. It would have called for an assembly of the
movements in workplaces and universities while reaching out to rural
communities as well.

Can
History Repeat?

Since
the seismic events of 1989, China’s economy has moved decisively
toward capitalism. What was, in the ‘80s, a mixed economy slowly
opening up to market forces is now irreversibly on the road to full
capitalism while still maintaining elements of state planning.

The
children of the rulers at that time have become billionaire
“princelings” and the state allows considerably less democratic
dissent.

However,
today the potential power of the Chinese working class is even
greater. According to World Bank statistics, China was 25% urban in
1989, today that number stands at over 58%. In the last 30 years,
rural workers have moved into cities to take manufacturing and
service sector jobs. In addition China is now challenging the U.S.
for economic dominance and is a far larger cog in the world economy
than in 1989. A similar type of movement today would not just bring
the Chinese bureaucracy to its knees, but would throw a wrench into
the entire world economy.

The
Chinese working class may be ready to move again. In 2010, the
Financial Times
estimated that there were about 80,000 “mass incidents” – which
is the term the Chinese use for mass protests or labor demonstrations
– per year in China. In 2018, a blogger was arrested for cataloging
“mass incidents” he and his wife had identified over 70,000 in
three years.

While
China was less affected by the Great Recession than other economies,
today its growth has slowed. This is just one of the trends that
could contribute to a new recession in the next few years. Such a
recession would hit China hard and throw the massive wealth
inequality in that country into stark relief. The balancing act that
the Chinese state engages in to keep itself afloat could be shaken in
the years to come.

On
June 4 of this year, massive commemorations of the Tiananmen Square
movement will take place in Hong Kong and Taiwan. The Chinese
government will do everything in its power to prevent this spirit
from reaching the mainland, but repression cannot stamp out an idea.
The memory of June 4, 1989 will inspire the next generation of
workers and youth to stand up and challenge the Chinese “communist”
government – a challenge which has the potential to inspire the
working class worldwide.

Socialist Alternative is a national organization fighting in our workplaces, communities, and campuses against the exploitation and injustices people face every day. We are community activists fighting against budget cuts in public services; we are activists campaigning for a $15 an hour minimum wage and fighting, democratic unions; we are people of all colors speaking out against racism and attacks on immigrants, students organizing against tuition hikes and war, women and men fighting sexism and homophobia.